


By Any Other Name

by ThePaintedScorpionDoll



Series: Winning is Easy; Governing's Harder [3]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Aeron Tabris, Aeron/Alistair, F/M, Tabristair - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-08
Updated: 2015-10-08
Packaged: 2018-04-25 09:20:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4954882
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThePaintedScorpionDoll/pseuds/ThePaintedScorpionDoll
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While preparing for their wedding, Alistair makes a request of his soon-to-be wife, the Hero of Ferelden.</p>
            </blockquote>





	By Any Other Name

Aeron finds a note from Alistair in her office, his normally neat and blocky handwriting at a speed-induced tilt. The message itself is short, consisting only of two lines:

_The starry tower. I promise it’s important this time._

Pacing across the stone floor of the Keep’s tallest tower is where Aeron finds him, their Mabari following closely at his heels. Shepard runs to her side when she clears her throat, eagerly circling her legs and barking until she pats his head.

“Hey, you. What’re you doing all the way up here, hm?” She scratches behind his ears and Shepard makes a pleased sound. “I thought you weren’t very fond of heights.”

“I may have bribed him with a little bit of pork left over from lunch.” Alistair looks relieved, but only briefly. “You got my note.”

Aeron straightens. “You said it was important.”

“Right! No, it is, I promise. It is. I just—” He approaches slowly, still somewhat wringing his hands. “I know it’s not the best time for this—we have _so many_ things we have to do _on top of_ planning this wedding—but I just…” He sighs a little. “I’ve been doing some thinking, and I just needed to ask you—”

“About what? Alistair, hey—”

“Hm?”

Aeron smiles at him. “Eloping is still an option, you know.”

Alistair offers a nervous little grin in return. “I’m not sure I want to risk angering your father, seeing how he actually likes me. No—” He falls into a new cycle of pacing and hand-wringing. “No, what I want to ask is…I mean, when elves get married, how do they decide which name they share? How is it passed down?”

“Generally? It’s whoever paid the bigger dowry.” And she laughs, even as Alistair’s handsome face grows fraught with worry. Even the dog makes a small noise of displeasure. “I— Sorry. That’s not— It’s just a little joke, my love.”

“How is it, really, then?” asks Alistair, looking no less worried.

“Well, I— A-actually, it’s sort of…” Aeron searches for the right description and finds the proper words dancing just beyond the end of her reach. “I mean, at least in my Alienage, what family name you use just isn’t… It matters more on paper, I guess, and the reputation attached to one over the other is certainly considered while planning marriages, but in the day-to-day—”

“Planning marriages?” Alistair goes still. “As in arranged—?”

She nods. “Perhaps the only thing we share in common with human nobles, and maybe for some of the same reasons.”

“So this… Our getting married out of love—”

“It’s not _unheard of_ , Alistair. Others in the Alienage have married for love. In my family, it seems like the norm. I mean, there’s my parents, Soris, us—though I, ah…I guess between the two of us, we’ve caused more upheaval with _who_ we’re marrying instead of _why_ …”

The worry on his face changes into discomfort. “Are they really still—?”

“It’s…” Aeron can feel the unease blooming on her face and wanders over to look out across the landscape. “Mostly, it’s Shianni. She just isn’t able to accept it and I’m—I’m not going to force her, Alistair. I almost can’t…” She shakes her head. “I can’t blame her at all, given what happened to her and everything she’s seen?”

“But it still bothers you, doesn’t it?” asks Alistair. The dog trots over with him and nudges her hand with his nose.

“We used to be very close. I’d still do anything I could to help her! But it… I can only do so much for her. Meanwhile, the rest of the Alienage…” Aeron crosses her arms and turns to face him. “I think it helps us, how we saved them during the war, so that they know that you’re not… But it’s always going to be something of an issue. You’re a shem, Alistair. A good one—better than most—but still a shem nonetheless. How can I even _begin_ to explain what it means that I choose to be with you instead of someone from back home? And all the things they still say about Soris because he’s not there to defend himself, even though he’s truly happy in Highever…”

She stops herself. Of all the times for these feelings to escape, why now? No answer comes, and Alistair only looks on at her with patience. There is concern, too, yes, and still plenty of the worry that has caused his pacing; but he has always been so patient, so eager to try and understand the unfamiliar when it relates to her.

“My love, you have nothing of our struggle in your veins and our children—if we’re lucky to have them because of what we’ve done to be Grey Wardens—will be flat-eared and move more freely through this world than I ever have. _But I accept those things_ ,” Aeron says before Alistair can speak, “because I love you more than I fear what it means for me to love you.”

“And constantly, I wonder what I did to ever be worthy of that much love.” He crosses the distance between them and takes her hands between his. “Any chance that you can tell me?”

Aeron laughs a little. “I may need a lifetime to figure it out, so just…try to stay alive, okay?”

“Ah! Well! If that’s all, I think—I think I can keep doing that. Definitely sounds easy enough, anyway.” There is now more relief on his face than she has seen in weeks. “Certainly sounds much easier than what I wanted to ask you, anyway—”

“Which was? You did say it was important.”

“And it is! It is. I just—” Alistair clears his throat. “There’s a reason I wanted to know about, y’know, the naming and all that, and it’s… Well, among humans, it’s usually the man’s name that passes on—at least, that’s how it is in Ferelden, anyway—”

“A touch odd,” Aeron says, “considering—”

“Yes. Well. I’ve been thinking about it—a lot, actually—and I…” He takes in a deep breath. “That isn’t what I want, Aeron. I’d rather share your name instead.”

“My name?”

“Mm-hm.”

“You mean to say that…you want to be known by Tabris, rather than Theirin?”

Alistair smiles at her. “Is it strange to hear?”

“It—” Aeron blinks a little. “Yes. A little. The whole of our relationship has been strange, really, but… Alistair, do you know what you’re saying? What it really means to say that?”

“Aeron, there is _a lot_ in this world that goes over my head. This isn’t one of them.” He wanders away from her again, clasping his hands behind his back. Shepard follows after him, trying to get his attention, eventually settling for sitting down at his side. “I’ve actually been thinking about it for a long time now. The idea just… It feels right, Aeron. It feels appropriate. And it’s like…

“I honestly don’t know how to explain this part, but I have this feeling, sometimes, when people find out my full name; it’s like I can feel them thinking of a man I never knew—a man they probably expect me to be like, nonetheless—instead of who I really am.”

Alistair glances over his shoulder as Aeron approaches. He shakes his head.

“Even if that man was my father, the name Theirin means so very little to me. Why keep it when there’s no obligation holding me to it? Tabris, on the other hand…” His expression turns warm. A new smile appears on his lips. “I would bear it proudly for the rest of my days. Even if all they think of is the Hero of Ferelden when I introduce myself, I would still rather have it that my name remind others of someone I love instead of a stranger’s ghost. Let them figure out what kind of man I strive to be so that I’m worthy of you. I’d prefer that.”

“Alistair…”

But once again, the proper words sit just beyond her reach. Aeron watches him in the light of the setting sun. Something deep inside of her (something very small, speaking in a very quiet voice) admits he would have made a fine king. He would have brought honor to his father’s name—has done so already as a Grey Warden, hasn’t he?

“Have you spoken to my father about it?”

To her surprise, Alistair nods. “The last time we were there. He promptly said it might be better if I asked the person I was marrying instead—”

“He would.”

“—but he also said he wouldn’t object. He said he knew, just from the way I looked at you when you don’t notice—”

“Because it’s the same way he’d look at my mother.” Aeron laughs a little. “He said the same thing to me after I finally told him about us and the shock wore off.”

“Oh, did he? So I guess that means I really do have his blessing then. Good.” Alistair draws her into his embrace. “What about yours?”

“Mine?”

“You _are_ the one I’m marrying, remember?”

She gasps at him. “How dare you accuse me of forgetting.”

“Not an accusation, love. A gentle reminder.” He glances at the dog. “Isn’t that right?” Shepard merely lies down and rests his head on his front paws, emitting a soft, disgruntled whine. “That’s not very helpful.”

“Maybe if you had bribed him with more pork,” Aeron says, and Shepard lets out a single bark, prompting a laugh out of both Wardens. “See?”

“Oh, fine! Later for you,” Alistair says. “You, on the other hand—”

“Me?”

“If you’re hoping I’ll forget the subject—”

“No,” she says, “I’m not. I’m just…” Aeron looks up at him. “Alistair, I am prepared to give you all that I have yet to give—including my name—if that is what you ask of me. If that’s really what you want—”

“I do.” Alistair nods, resolve set as he reaches up to cradle her face. “ _I do._ And what remains mine to give—I give that to you, freely. Eagerly. Starting with this.”

It never fails to amaze her, how the simple act of kissing him always makes her chest feel full to the point of bursting; like there is too much love rushing in at once to contain. And to think that there will be a lifetime of this—of Alistair pulling her close, of getting to kiss him; of being able to bask in sunsets and talk and simply _be_ —

Aeron is dizzy from the thought when the kiss ends, and breathless besides, but she is smiling.

“It’s yours,” she tells him, then thinks better of it after another kiss. “It’s ours.”

“Ours.” Alistair smiles back at her. “I could grow to quite like the sound of that.”

And, as it happily turns out, so can she.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by a conversation with [disputedleech](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Disputedleech); he casually mentioned the idea of a romanced Alistair taking his wife's name in any timeline where he didn't become king/remained a Warden, and it was too good of an idea to resist.


End file.
